Thursday, November 9, 2017

ASOR’s Cultural Heritage Initiatives Weekly Reports

ASOR’s Cultural Heritage Initiatives is a cooperative agreement between
ASOR and the U.S. Department of State that is designed to document,
protect, and preserve the cultural heritage of war-torn Syria and
northern Iraq. Hundreds of significant heritage sites have been damaged
since fighting began in 2011. Although the destruction of cultural
property represents only part of the humanitarian crisis, these harmful
actions threaten our common world heritage and the cultural diversity of
the people in Syria and northern Iraq. We have an ethical obligation to
respond, and our project is part of an international effort to work
with Syrians to protect their heritage and cultural identity

• New video shows ISIL militants intentional destruction of antiquities in Deir ez-Zor Governorate, Syria. (ASOR CHI Incident Report SHI 17-0081)• An old house in Aleppo was purchased and is being dismantled for transport to Lebanon. (ASOR CHI Incident Report SHI 17-0086)• New photographs show damage to the Maltai Reliefs in Iraq. (ASOR CHI Incident Report IHI 17-0026)• New photographs were released of damage to the Mosul University Library. (ASOR CHI Incident Report IHI 17-0016 UPDATE)

The primary focus of the project is notice and comment on open access material relating to the ancient world, but I will also include other kinds of networked information as it comes available.

The ancient world is conceived here as it is at the Institute for the Study of the Ancient World at New York University, my academic home at the time AWOL was launched. That is, from the Pillars of Hercules to the Pacific, from the beginnings of human habitation to the late antique / early Islamic period.

AWOL is the successor to Abzu, a guide to networked open access data relevant to the study and public presentation of the Ancient Near East and the Ancient Mediterranean world, founded at the Oriental Institute, University of Chicago in 1994. Together they represent the longest sustained effort to map the development of open digital scholarship in any discipline.